A Time to Kill
by Rokesmith
Summary: During the Second World War, James Bond travels to New York to kill a traitor, and takes his first step on the path to becoming 007. A prequel to Ian Fleming's Bond. Contains scenes of violence.
1. Chapter 1: Towers of Babel

**A Time to Kill**

Rokesmith

**Disclaimer:** James Bond is property of Penguin Books and Columbia Pictures. This story was written for fun not profit.

**Author's Note:** This story is inspired by an incident mentioned by James Bond in the novel _Casino Royale_. The story contains details of Bond and his life drawn from Ian Fleming's novels. Since the story takes place in early 1944, I estimate Bond's to be around 24, currently serving in Naval Intelligence and holding the rank of lieutenant. Anderson Airport, where Bond arrives was the name Idlewild Airport - later J.F.K. - held from 1943 to 1948.

* * *

Chapter One: Towers of Babel

On the fourth of March, 1944, James Bond walked out of Anderson Airport, New York, into the chill of an East Coast spring. The freezing Atlantic wind whipped around him as he stepped from the terminal, taking a packet of cigarettes from the inside pocket of a suit crumpled by the twenty-nine hour journey, and lighting one in the shelter of his hat. Then he picked up his suitcase and hailed one of the city's famous Yellow Cabs, telling the driver to take him to the Pennsylvania Hotel.

The cab driver cheerfully asked him what brought him to the city, and Bond told him it was business. And it was business, of a sort. James Bond had come to New York to kill a man.

Bond had not been to New York since he was a child, and the city had changed since then, growing upwards. He wondered if the taxi ride was designed to showcase all these new art deco achievements, taking him first through the brand-new Midtown Tunnel, before passing the Chrysler Building, the cathedral-like Grand Central Station before finally allowing him a view of the Empire State Building, the tallest building in the world.

By the time he reached the Pennsylvania, Bond was convinced that the architects of Babel had been set loose in the city. The hotel seemed to have been modelled on a castle, a giant, solid edifice with four blocks that looked like towers. The lobby was enormous; the door opened by a man wearing a uniform modelled on that of the Ritz, letting Bond into a long marble hall with a long reception desk along one side, divided into sections by rectangular pillars. He was shown to his room by a bellboy barely younger than he was, and sat down on the sumptuous bed.

He took his hat off, pulled up a chair, sitting staring out of the window at Penn Station, and smoked another cigarette as he watched the traffic. Then he began to unpack his suitcase, carefully shaking out the suits that his new housekeeper had painstakingly folded, and hanging them in his wardrobe. The first two folded shirts carefully concealed the semiautomatic Beretta, silencer and shoulder holster that Bond placed on the bed beside him.

He was just reaching for his shaving kit when he heard the sound of a key in the lock. Housekeeping would knock first, and he had been there for less than an hour. As the handle turned, he seized the Beretta and spun, aiming the gun at the figure half way through the door. He was a tall man in his mid thirties, built like a rugby prop but wearing a smart suit. His brown hair was cut just too short for fashion and his dark eyes watched the gun in Bond's hand without reaction.

"Come inside," Bond said. "Close the door behind you."

The man stepped the rest of the way through the door and pushed it closed with his foot. He kept his hands where Bond could see them and his eyes never left the gun.

"Christopher Grey, MI6. 008. If you want to shoot me with that, old boy, I suggest you put a silencer on it first."

"Bond. James Bond. Naval Intelligence." He lowered the gun. "You paid the bellboy to tell you when I arrived?"

Grey nodded. "Very good, old boy. It's an old trick but it's never let me down yet. Now, get yourself showered and shaved, put on a suit that doesn't look quite so much like you slept in it, and I'll take you for lunch."

While Bond dressed, he thought about the man he'd been told he was meeting, the man now relaxing in the chair and smoking a cigarette with three gold bands. 008. A man with a licence to kill. There were six double-oh agents, he had found out; there had been ten when the war started. He found himself wondering what Grey had done to earn that number, and how many people the polite, ordinary-looking man had killed in the line of duty.

When he was dressed, the two men left the room and Grey led Bond through the corridors until they reached the back stairs. Making sure there was no one on the stairwell, the pair descended and left the building through one of its back entrances. The side street they stepped into was deserted except for a man in a dark suit, leaning against the side of the building reading a newspaper. He was a small man with olive skin and sharp eyes that watched the two Englishmen as they approached.

"Sam Petri, FBI." He had a broad accent; a mixture New York inflections, but with a trace of Italian still audible beneath them. "Welcome to the United States, Mr Bond. Anything you need, just ask. Anyone else asks, I'm just the guy you hired to drive you around."

Petri led them to a Yellow Cab parked at the entrance to the street and got in the front. Grey gave him the address of somewhere nearby and Petri drove them there. It turned out to be a small restaurant in the shadow of the Empire State Building. Petri dropped them off, promising to collect them in an hour, and they took a corner booth, well away from most of the diners.

Bond looked uncertainly at the menu. Grey saw him doing it and smiled.

"There's no rationing here, old boy. Make the most of it. I know it's only American food, but when one is dining on the company, one should always eat every meal like it is one's last."

When the waiter arrived, Grey politely asked for a bowl of chicken soup, followed by an eight ounce steak, medium rare, with potatoes and salad, to be accompanied by a pot of coffee and concluded with a slice of cheesecake. Bond hesitated for a moment, and then ordered the same.

Once they were alone, Grey cast a cautious glance around to make sure there was no one in the noisy restaurant close enough to hear. "What do you know about our man?"

Bond shrugged. "Tomo Fujitaka, goes by Tom. Thirty-two years old, grandfather came over to America from Japan, came to England from San Francisco with his father at age ten. Attended Cambridge and held a job in the city till the war started, but over the last four years he's been working on something very, very secret. No one thought he was a security risk, but several months ago he was contacted by the Japanese intelligence and last week he somehow got out of England and came here with something the Japs can't be allowed to have."

"That's the gist of it." Grey nodded. "At our request, the FBI has had agents visibly following him since he arrived. We're certain we know where the drop is going to take place: in the RCA building of the Rockefeller Centre. Today his tails are going to stop and in the next few days he will feel secure enough to make the drop. And the fox will come to the hunters."

The restaurant filled quickly, so the conversation changed. Bond talked to Grey about Eton, comparing his memories from the time before he had been forced to leave and attend school in Scotland with Grey's experiences there. Bond talked about running, boxing and judo, and then listened as Grey told stories of playing rugby at Eton and Oxford, including the time he had been sent off for dislocating the knee of the Harrow fly-half. The meal they ate as they talked was delicious, Bond found himself wanting to eat as though he were starving, but forced himself to take his time, following Grey's example and savouring every bite.

Bond got back into Petri's cab feeling pleasantly full, for the first time in what seemed like an eternity. "Take us to the Rockefeller Center," he said.

"Take your time," Grey added.

"Do you know what Fujitaka has?" Bond asked.

"I'm afraid they didn't tell me, old boy," Grey replied. "Not even double-ohs get told everything. But I know that whatever it is, it has men in Whitehall, all the way up to Churchill, very frightened. Whatever our man has and is going to give to Japs, I think it could change the course of the war."


	2. Chapter 2: Burn Before Reading

**A Time to Kill**

Rokesmith

**Author's Note:** Station X, which 008 refers to in this chapter, was the codename of the British codebreaking operation at Bletchley Park. The ordinary men and women who worked there allowed the Allies to read the German codes throughout the war, including the 'unbreakable' Enigma codes. It was the war's best kept secret, no one who worked there or knew about it spoke about it until the British government released the information thirty years after the end of the war.

* * *

Chapter Two: Burn Before Reading

The Rockefeller Center was a giant architectural sculpture in the heart of Midtown Manhattan. Fourteen buildings taking up an area the size of a small park, completed only a few years ago. A monument to capitalism, and to the determination of the man who had paid for it all out of his own pocket at the height of the Depression. It was one of the most impressive sights Bond had seen in his life, crowned by the central RCA Building, seventy storeys stretching up from the golden statue of Prometheus towards a flat roof, from which could be seen a spectacular view of the city. It was up there, high above, on the thirty-fifth floor, that Tomo Fujitaka would go to make his drop to the Japanese intelligence services, inside the Japanese consulate itself, and there that his life would end.

Petri led him away from Prometheus to a building just across the plaza. The three men took an elevator to the fortieth floor, and then walked along to an office with a view through the window of the left side of the RCA Building. The office itself was empty, the walls were bare and the only furniture was two chairs, a desk and a standing lamp.

Bond stood near the window, looking out. Three hundred yards away, he could see clearly through the windows of the Japanese consulate, people moving about on their day to day business. Grey stood beside him and handed him a photo, taken from a file, the photo of a young Japanese man with carefully arranged hair, squinting slightly through wire-rimmed glasses. It was a photo Bond had first seen four days ago at his briefing and, then as now, he didn't think it looked like the picture of a traitor.

Petri gave them a short-range radio, saying that an agent on watch would radio up when they sighted Fujitaka. They could also call down if they needed anything. Then he wished them a cautious good luck and left. Bond pulled up a chair next to the table and lit a cigarette, and Grey sat down next to him. They sat facing each other, but with half an eye on the windows on the other building.

"How could Fujitaka change the course of the war?" Bond asked.

"I'm honestly not sure," Grey told him, "but he was a city accountant, and a very good one, who could apparently solve the Times crossword in fifteen minutes. He was very quietly recruited by the navy just like hundreds of other men and women from all over the country. What do they have in common, old boy? They're all crossword champions, and they were all set to work somewhere near either Oxford or Cambridge. They call it Station X and that's all anyone will ever know, because not a single person in the services, the Ministry or MI6 will talk about it. This is the most secret thing I have ever heard of, most of them don't even know it exists and I've yet to hear of anyone below flag rank who'll even speak its name."

Bond listened, fascinated. "And this is where Fujitaka worked? What do you think it is?"

Grey stubbed out his cigarette and leaned forward, as though even he were afraid of being overheard. "I think it's the reason the wolf packs have been going hungry for years, the reason we often seem to know what the Wehrmacht is going to do before it does, the reason I have been given information there is no possible reason on this Earth for anyone on our side to know. Things that result in orders that your friends in the navy call BBR: burn before reading."

"We're cracking Enigma?" Bond whispered.

"I charge you, my friend, never to breathe a word of this to another living soul as long as you live," Grey said. "But if I am correct, there may be more at risk than no longer knowing what Jerry is thinking."

"If the Japs get this information they'll pass it onto the Germans." Bond nodded, "The Germans will change their codes and we won't be able to read them anymore. This'll make life easier for the Japs but..." Then he followed the chain of reasoning and understood what Grey meant, "The invasion. The whole south of England is filling with troops ready to land in France this summer. And Churchill never wanted to invade France, he wants Italy or to take another crack at Turkey. If we really know what the High Command is thinking, and if we lose that now, he might call it off."

Grey lit another cigarette. "Now you know what could be at stake, old boy,"

There was a gentle knock at the door. Grey stood and opened it. He stood aside as two men carrying a large, heavy desk struggled into the office and put it down against the far wall. Bond waited until they were gone before walking over to the desk and kneeling beside it. He turned a carefully concealed latch and slid open a compartment in the wood. Reaching into the compartment, he put his hand on cold metal, and carefully withdrew a Remington rifle with a sniper scope and a silencer. There was another rifle in there for Grey, along with a small toolkit and a note that read simply _Compliments of J. Edgar Hoover_.

Bond picked up his rife, steadying it against his shoulder and looking down the scope at the three windows on the thirty-fifth floor of the RCA Building. The faces were clear now, as he moved the crosshairs from one to another, mentally adjusting for the wind and the weapon's kick. Each face was a target on the range back in England, where he had done his sniper training two years earlier and spent a day reacquainting himself with the art and the weapon he now held. Not a face, not a person, just a red dot in the centre of a sequence of black circles, that was all.

He carefully put the rifle down and looked up at Grey. "You know why I'm here?" the other man asked.

Bond nodded. "In case I miss, or in case I can't. You don't need to worry."

"No, I don't think I do," Grey said. "Not with you, old boy, not for this job. There really is a time for everything. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant and a time to uproot."

But he left it to Bond to finish the sentiment.

"And a time to kill."

* * *

After that, they waited. There was no way to know how long it would be before Fujitaka came to the consulate. Perhaps a day, perhaps longer. Grey told Bond to sleep, but he was awoken by the arrival of the next delivery, this one a dull metal filing cabinet containing army rations, Chesterfield cigarettes and a jar of Nescafe instant coffee that they could brew with the water supply from the nearby bathroom and the kettle which arrived late that afternoon.

The RCA Building was locked from midnight until five in the morning, so they both used that opportunity to sleep, waking long before the sun rose. They took turns to wash and shave in the bathroom while the other one kept watch. They ate the cold, hard rations for breakfast, and Bond asked Grey how his suit managed to stay so tidy despite being slept in. Grey smiled and told him that all Bond had to do was buy his suits from the right place. Then they went back to waiting, watching the traffic on the avenues and the people crossing the plaza. Once every hour, on the hour, Bond found himself picking up the picture of Tomo Fujitaka and staring at it, burning every detail into his memory.

"Why me?" He asked, towards the end of the second day.

"I've been waiting for you to ask that, old boy," Grey replied. "I was told that the services requested one of their men do the job. The navy claimed responsibility for letting him slip out of the country so they said their man should clean it up. The Old Man picked you himself from a dozen files. He said he liked the cut of your jib. I think he has plans for you."

"The Old Man?" Bond inquired.

Grey smiled. "My boss. The head of MI6, a retired admiral. He goes by 'M'."

"M?"

"M."

The evening passed, and the morning came. The day was filled with idle conversation, coffee, cigarettes and ration food. Even though he regularly washed and shaved, Bond still felt dirty all over, even inside his mouth. The boredom was crushing, and he could see Grey was feeling the strain of it too, even though they had each other for company and someone at the FBI had thoughtfully provided a pack of cards. Hours seemed to pass at a snail's pace, the day dragging on forever.

Until finally, at twenty minutes to six on the third day, the radio receiver crackled into life and spoke the words Bond had been waiting for: "He's here."


	3. Chapter 3: Shaken but not Stirred

**A Time to Kill**

Rokesmith

* * *

Chapter Three: Shaken but Not Stirred

Suddenly, it was all gone. The boredom, the exhaustion, the aches, pains and grime all vanished as Bond heard those words. The world seemed to come into sharp focus, seen through clear eyes and a clear mind. But he felt no tingle of excitement in his fingers, and his heart rate had barely changed.

It was getting dark outside, a spring twilight. Down below, people were streaming home from their offices and the building around them was full of the noise of the exodus towards home and family. Lights were being turned off in the offices of the RCA Building, but the lights of the Japanese consulate were still on.

Grey locked the door of the office and turned off the lights. Bond picked up the tool kit and extracted a tool commonly used by burglars. This new safety glass was incredibly strong, but even it had its weakness. Bond used the diamond cutter to carve out a circle from the glass for himself, and then one for Grey, letting the sound of the high-altitude wind whistle through the silent office.

He knelt down and picked up his rifle, feeling the weight of the gun, the chill of the metal barrel and the warmth of the wooden butt. He checked it was loaded, removed the safety catch and cocked the weapon, hearing and feeling Grey do the same. He steadied the rifle, slipped it through the whole in the safety glass and closed his left eye to stare down the sniper sight with his right.

"Ready, 008?"

"Ready, Bond."

"Fire on my word."

Two of the three consulate rooms were still occupied. The third, a filing room, was empty. Bond guessed that was where Fujitaka would make the drop, and as he watched he was proved right. The door cautiously opened and the man from the file photo, the target, stepped slowly into the room, holding an attaché case in his right hand. He very slowly looked around and started walking over towards the filing cabinets by the window. He bent down, slid the attaché case into the gap between two of the cabinets, and then straightened up.

"Fire."

The crack of the silenced shot was barely audible above the sound of the wind. Three hundred yards away, a jagged hole was torn in the office window, slivers of glass exploding inwards. The target turned at the sound, staring in astonishment at the hole in the window.

Bond saw him. He saw him through the scope as clearly as if he had been shaking the man's hand. He was frozen to the spot, the eyes were wide behind the glasses, the mouth was open in confusion.

Bond fired.

The rifle only seemed to whisper its report, and Bond hardly felt the vicious kick against his shoulder. Through the scope he saw Fujitaka's head jerk backwards, a fine cloud of blood expanding from the back of his head. He fell like a puppet with cut strings. An eternity seemed to pass as he fell. Then he struck the floor, lying limp and still, his arms spread, his eyes open, blood trickling from his mouth.

Bond tore his eye from the scope, and pulled the rifle back, suddenly aware of the ache in his right shoulder. He made the weapon safe and then stood and helped Grey push one of the desks against the window to cover up the twin holes.

When he looked up at the window again, he saw the scene occurring in the consulate office. Three men were gathered around the body while a fourth held the hand of a woman dressed like a secretary who was visibly sobbing. In the other room, the last of the consulate officers was on the telephone.

"Time to go." Grey said.

He helped Bond conceal the rifles in the compartment in the desk where the FBI would retrieve them in a few hours, then the pair left the office. They had reached the hall before Bond suddenly stopped, looked down at his hands, and realised they were shaking.

Then it all came crashing down on him like a wave. Everything he had just done, taking a life, even a traitor's life, and what had been at stake. His career, his service, his country; all of it had been at risk. He felt sick, as though he were about to vomit. He took a deep breath to control himself, then another. Leaning against the wall he closed his eyes, but all he could see then was the startled face and wide eyes of Tomo Fujitaka.

"Are you alright, Bond?"

Bond opened his eyes and forced himself to nod. "My first."

"Here." Grey lit one of his last bespoke Morland cigarettes and handed it to Bond. "It happens to the best of us. I killed nine men before I was given my double-oh status, three in cold blood. It's worst the first time, but I still don't like it."

"I did as I was ordered." Bond took a deep drag. "I did my job. Now let's finish it."

They took the elevator downstairs to where Petri was waiting with a group of FBI agents. The two Englishmen blended into the group as they all headed up into the RCA Building. Building security had already forced the witnesses to leave, and the agents cleared out the corridor and the offices and began to take witness statements.

"You've got five minutes to get what you came for," Petri told them.

He left the room and stood outside the door. Grey went through Fujitaka's pockets while Bond retrieved that attaché case from between the filing cabinets. He opened the case. All that was inside it was a single manila folder with what Bond estimated were a dozen or so sheets of paper inside. He did not open it. He just held it for a few moments, wondering whether Grey was right about what was inside. But he was not being paid to satisfy his curiosity, he had a job to do.

Bond picked up a steel wastebasket and put the folder in it. Grey threw him his Ronson lighter, and Bond ran the flame around the edge of the documents. He thought it was a suitable fate for information nicknamed BBR.

He gave the lighter to Grey and watched the secret documents consumed by the flames. Then he picked up the bin and shook it out through the hole in the window. The ashes hung in the darkness for an instant, then they were swept away by the wind and lost in the night.

Bond led Grey out of the room. "We're done here," He said to Petri. "Thank you."

"My pleasure." Petri tipped his hat to the pair. "When the press ask, we'll hint he was doubling for us and it was the Japs who shot him. He'll be a hero. It's been a pleasure working with you, gentlemen. I hope you remember our co-operation in the future."

The three men exchanged handshakes and then Bond and Grey took an elevator downstairs and hailed a taxi. Grey gave the driver an address and sat back with Bond, watching the evening traffic go by.

"Why do you think he did it?" Bond asked. "Money? Loyalty? Some misguided belief that it was the right thing to do?"

"Does it matter?" Grey said.

"No. I suppose not."

Bond was not surprised when the cab stopped outside a bar. It was still early, and they found a table. Reports of their success would filter back to England from Petri, and in the morning, Bond thought, he would take a long flight back and report in person; as would Grey, to the mysterious M. Then either Bond would be given some time off or, more likely, he would be assigned a new mission. But all that could wait.

"There's girl over there looking at you, old boy," Grey observed, tipping his head in the direction of pretty, dark eyed secretary sharing a drink with some friends.

Bond smiled. "Her friend is looking at you."

"Then in five minutes we shall buy them a drink," Grey said. "But first, you and I need one. It's always best to have a strong drink after a job."

"I'll follow your lead," Bond told him.

"You'll do very well, old boy," Grey said as he headed towards the bar. "Very well indeed."

"What can I get you, gents?" the barman asked.

"Something very strong and very well made," Grey replied, scanning the drinks menu and the racks of bottles behind the bar. "I know just the thing! Two vodka martinis. Shaken, not stirred."


End file.
